Sex Appeal in Advertising

Looking through the magazine, Cosmopolitan, there was no shock in the types of articles or advertisements that were present page after page. Considering the majority of the magazine is advertisements for women’s products, I came across a few that especially stood out.

Ad #1. This advertisement was a for Bulova watches with the image of a watch shown and a woman in the distance behind it. “Designed to me noticed” is written at the bottom of the ad, but ironically for the woman, she is barely noticed because a watch is covering her face. However, the woman’s body and the image of her bare leg are certainly visible.

Ad #2. American Laser Skincare – “Beauty through technology” is the first thing that stands out, mainly because it is in bold print. The image on this ad is of an attractive woman and the words “beautiful feeling” is written under her. This ad offers cellulite reduction, body shaping, and Botox along with other procedures. It gives the message to readers that they will not be beautiful or feel good if they do not invest their money in these types of treatments.

Ad #3. This advertisement is for SKYY vodka that puts women’s bodies next to the bottle to sell it. It clearly uses sex appeal to sell an alcoholic beverage with the image being cut off at the top of their bikini with no sight of their actual faces.

Ad #4. This advertisement is for the weight loss supplement, Hydroxycut. “ I feel beautiful because I used Hydroxycut” is written above a before and after image of a woman. This advertisement is using plain folk appeal, but many would say the woman in the before image is barely over weight at all. You can see that the after image of her is just fitting into society’s image of what is beautiful.

Ad #5. This advertisement is for Fendi perfume that has an image behind the product of three women. These women are of course naked with blurs of fog on the ad to cover up parts. They are very close to each other in the ad and posing extremely promiscuous to sell the product through sex appeal.

All of these ads depicted women as servants to society rather then actual individuals. They were either used in these ads as objects to men or to be sucked into diet pills to be society’s version of beautiful. This is even more confusing because women work so hard to get the perfect body, indulging themselves in not enough food and too many supplements. The question though is why? Is the goal here really to be happy with yourself or is it just to please others?

These advertisements with half naked women with their faces cut out may answer that question. Society seems to keep going further in feeding women all of these ways to be perfect, while dehumanizing them along the way. Nowhere in the magazine contained an image of a strong, independent woman that was not half naked or that was actually trying to attain something other than beauty.

A female’s body next to SKYY vodka or a body of a ballerina in the background of a watch advertisement is in every way demeaning. Women can never be skinny or beautiful enough. On one page an article goes on to state that women should be confident, the next is an advertisement for American Laser Skincare proposing “beauty through technology.”

This is not only a contradiction, but also a major problem in our culture. It seems people are being sucked into the concept that confidence walks hand and hand with plastic surgery. Even worse, that making a man or society happy is more important than actually making yourself happy.